Dating Pool: OkCupid and their Questions

I wouldn’t say I’m using Okcupid for dates, per se, right now. I’m just not in a date-like frame of mind anymore it seems. But I AM actively using it to find like-minded friends, even friends with no chance of having benefits on the side. That’s my preference right now because I need like minded friends, live and in person, because I really really badly miss my bubble.

There’s people on OKC who answer a lot of questions, and people who don’t. All I can hope is that they’ve answered the ones that are important to me; the ones that make or break it. These answers have saved me from big wastes of time; once, I didn’t quite listen to the answers and had a 3-month waste of time.

These questions help me weed out people who would find my looks or my availability status to be less-than-ideal. I’ve actually had guys still hit on me when our answers do not match up which blows my mind. Both times when I’ve called the guy out on it they’ve said “oh we can work around that” or “I’m not sure why I answered it that way, I find you attractive”. Most times I don’t bother to call them out on it, I just ignore them (or  in cases or people who looked like we could potentially be a match outside of friendship while doing my own searches, unfavorable answers meant I didn’t message them).

  • Can overweight people still be sexy?
  • If one of your potential matches was overweight, would that be a dealbreaker?
  • Would you consider connecting with someone whose relationship status is ‘seeing someone’ or ‘married’?
  • How willing are you to meet someone from OkCupid in person?1
  • Would you date someone who was already in a committed relationship with someone else?

These next questions help me determine their queer-frame-of-mind, lifestyle and general “If you don’t know this, I can’t know you” fields.

  • Do you ever feel the need to get really drunk? 2
  • Do you believe in dinosaurs? 3
  • To you, is abortion an option in case of an unwanted accidental pregnancy?4
  • “Wherefore art thou Romeo?” What does “wherefore” mean in this context?5
  • Straight women who kiss or fondle each other in clubs in the hopes of attracting men are… 6
  • How important is religion/God in your life? 7
  • Is contraception morally wrong?
  • Which is closest to your reaction to foul language? 8
  • Do you like cats? Would you consider owning a cat as a pet? 9
  • Did you join OkCupid just so you could find people to have sex with? 10
  • The idea of gay and lesbian couples having children is: 11
  • Which best represents your opinion of same-sex relationships?

Some people on the site blow off the “matching algorithm” but I don’t. It’s based mostly on these questions, and they’re usually pretty right. I have, happily, made two female friends that I will soon be meeting in person. I need more female friends in my life. Really do. It can be a bit disheartening when I put so much effort into my profile and making it really “me” and then I find someone who sounds really awesome and we’re a great mathematical match and I message them along the lines of “Hey you’re rad, let’s be friends” (but not as pathetic as that) and then I never hear from them. Puzzling is when I message them and they never respond but I see them checking out my profile once a week or so. No, my fat ass didn’t magically melt off, I am no more attractive to you. Is the “bisexual married to a man” thing going to make a lesbian dismiss me totally even as a friend? So far seems to be the case, unless of course they all just find my personality revolting *shrugs*.

There’s a lot of other questions that I’ve ranked “somewhat important”; they’re not deal-breakers but I still consider them if they give an answer that I didn’t choose as being acceptable to me.

One odd thing to note: Whenever I encounter a person who matches me in either friend/match high 80’s or above, and they’ve answered the “How often do you use Twitter” question is it always answered as “never”. I’ve put it as an important question to me I guess because I’m not sure I’d know how to communicate with someone who isn’t tied much to online/social media.

So if you’re on OkC, what are YOUR deal-breaker questions?

Don’t worry, there’s been enough activity for a Dickhead Files post or two in the near future ;)

  1. The only answer I deem acceptable on this one is “totally willing”, and I even put in an explanation of “If you’re not totally willing, then what the fuck are you doing here?”
  2. often” is unacceptable
  3. “no” is unacceptable
  4. I went into this paragraph-long ranty rant in my explanation for this question directed to those who might answer “no”
  5. I am by no means a student of Shakespeare and I retained very little from High School but for chrissakes if you don’t know that “wherefore” means “why” then I will slap you
  6. anything other than “profoundly annoying” is the wrong answer
  7. “extremely important” is the only wrong answer
  8. if it bothers you a lot, we will have problems
  9. if you truly dislike cats, that’s really not ideal
  10. Answer “yes”? Move along, then
  11. acceptable/unacceptable, you know the right answer in my eyes

4 Responses

  1. Catharine says:

    I love that there’s a question about dinosaurs.

    I really like reading blog posts about dating sites. I always end up feeling that dating sites are mildly terrifying, but it’s fascinating.

  2. Jake Holden says:

    I love OkCupid’s questions – especially the sex and ethics one – you can really get a feel for someone’s attitudes from it.

    The part where it guesses your personality traits from your questions is scarily accurate too. Check mine out:

    more experienced in sex, more extroverted, more sex-driven, more confident, more adventurous, more drug-friendly, more kinky, more ambitious, more literary, more independent, more energetic, more spontaneous, more trusting, more logical, more cool

    less spiritual, less romantic, less conventionally moral, less love-driven, less pure, less old-fashioned

    This is all compared to guys my age across the world, I think. It sounds pretty apt!

  3. Adriana says:

    I feel you. Especially on the Romeo Q. SERIOUSLY.

  4. Sugarcunt says:

    Some of OKCupid’s questions are great for weeding people out (like when I was contacted by a guy who was clearly anti-queer, shared NO interests with me, but had answered that he’d prefer an overweight partner? Chubby-chaser, check. Move along), but some of them really frustrate me because people will write things very black-and-white and leave no room for a shade of grey. A lot of my my OKC answers have really extensive essays beneath them because I just don’t like the options given, and some of them, I don’t even answer at all. That can be frustrating.

    ~ I explain my answers A LOT. And yeah, they often present you with very black and white options and it is frustrating. But some questions are good.